


if i'm dreaming, baby (please don't wake me up)

by stonesnuggler



Series: erie forever, otters for life [1]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Erie Otters ensemble, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Rule 63, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2019-05-31 13:42:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15120632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonesnuggler/pseuds/stonesnuggler
Summary: “You know those moments when you’re running drills,” he says, suddenly, “and suddenly one thing goes, like, minorly haywire but it helps you to figure out the best way to do the thing?”There’s worry in his tone, like he’s worried Alex won’t understand what he’s trying to say.Of course she will. She’ll get it, because she getshim.Still, Alex nods, says, “Yeah. What about them?”“I think I just had one,” he says, slow and calculated, like he’s choosing his words very carefully.Alex resists the urge to grab his hand, and instead takes a deep breath and says, “and it’s not about hockey.”Dylan huffs a laugh, shaking his head as he looks down at his hands, then over at Alex. “Not entirely."[Or: Alex and Dylan are best friends. That's it. That's all. Until it's not.]





	if i'm dreaming, baby (please don't wake me up)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LottieAnna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LottieAnna/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [LottieAnna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LottieAnna/pseuds/LottieAnna) in the [PuckingRare2018](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/PuckingRare2018) collection. 



> to my dearest lotts, who prompted dylan falling in love with yet another one of his best friends. thank you for bringing me the idea of alex debrincat in all of her fiesty glory, for chatficcing her with me when i needed to the most, and for prompting something that finally pushed me to write these losers in love. 
> 
> to the village that this fic needed to be raised into the monster it is today. thank you for letting me shout about these idiots and for your validation. 
> 
> and to the pucking rare mods, for making this fic fest happen!!

As she’s in the passenger seat en route to Erie, Pennsylvania, Alex wonders how her plan for the next five years turned into one of those moments that passes in the blink of an eye. 

Look, she’s gotten the whole ‘ _ you’re only sixteen, what do you need a five year plan for? _ ’ bit before. But, like, the thing is that in five years, she’ll be twenty-one, and by twenty-one she’s going to be playing in the National Hockey League, no matter the path she takes to get there.

Nobody believes her, but  _ she _ believes herself, and well. That’s really all that matters.  

A year ago, that path involved graduating from Lake Forest, going right to University of Massachusetts and hopefully,  _ hopefully _ getting drafted. 

Well, let’s just say that plans change. And sometimes, plans change in the direction of playing hockey on a team -- even maybe on a  _ line _ \-- with the Next Next One and his probably-top-five best friend. 

Like, holy fucking shit, right?

“Lexi, are you okay, sweetie?” her mom asks, pokes at Alex’s thigh and she grimaces at the pet name.

“I’ll be better if you don’t call me Lexi,” Alex jokes, and she worries for a second before her mom smiles knowingly. 

“I know,” her mom says with a sigh. “Old habits die hard.”

“Don’t go all ‘ _ my baby is growing up’  _ on me now,” Alex says, rolling her eyes. “I was gone literally all last year.” 

“And it took me weeks to get over it!” her mom says, laughing easily, albeit a little watery. “Seven hours away is a little different than four, is all I’m saying.”

“I’ll call you every week,” Alex promises, and her mom knows she will, because she did last year. 

And Alex is her mom’s baby, no matter how much she claims that she’s grown up. And maybe she’s a little teary eyed at the idea of moving from team she grew with at Lake Forest, the team that would do anything for her, the team filled with brothers -- one by blood, the rest by heart. 

“But you’re okay, right?” 

“Yeah, mom,” Alex says. “I’m okay.”

//

Turns out, she’s more than okay, judging by how she’s seen at camp, judging how quickly she’s moved from a temporary billet to a more permanent situation.

“You’ve got the upstairs bedroom across the hall from Dylan,” her billet mom, Jen, says as she’s helping Alex carry her bags up the stairs. She sets the bag she was carrying next to the door across from one wide open, murmuring sounds of a movie playing through it. “Ignore the disaster he tends to keep it, with his door  _ wide open _ .” 

Alex laughs a little, met with a very indignant Dylan as he pops his head out of said disaster room, since his door is, you guessed it, wide open. 

“It’s not that bad!” he says, hair matted down on one side, curls wild on the other. 

“You’ve been here for a week and I can barely see the floor, bud,” Jen says, patting him on the shoulder. Dylan looks like he’s about to argue, but then this dumb grin stretches across his face and he shrugs.

“Fair,” he concedes. “Hey, Brinks.” 

Alex smiles, thankful for the familiarity of hockey, the easiness of falling into nicknames, to team systems even in a non-team setting.

“Tornado Stromer, in his element” Alex says, nodding to his still open door. 

Dylan rolls his eyes. “I give your room a week, tops. Bet you’re nowhere near as neat as you let on.” 

“Oh, you’re on,” Alex says, eyebrows raised, chipped fingernail polish pointing right at his stupid smarmy grin. 

Yeah, he and Alex are going to get along just fine.

x

After dinner, Alex heads up to start unpacking, but she’s got a bit of a shadow. 

“Need any help?” Dylan asks, leaning against her door frame.

Alex looks around, considering, wondering why Dylan would even offer to help, but ultimately, she shrugs.

“If you want,” she says, folding a pair of athletic shorts before tucking them into her dresser. “It’s mostly just clothes.”

“Easy,” Dylan says, then plops down on the floor next to her. “I’m a boss at folding t-shirts.”

“Somehow, I doubt that,” Alex jokes, pawing through her suitcase for the rest of her shorts. She’s really rethinking her method of packing, considering there’s not really a method at all. “Given the state of your room.”

Dylan pauses, raises an eyebrow and gestures to the mess Alex has created in her flurry of unpacking. “You’re joking, right?”

“This doesn’t count,” Alex says, finger pointed straight at his face, but his expression doesn’t change in the slightest. Eventually, she rolls her eyes. “Whatever. The little blue suitcase is t-shirts, go nuts.”

“Solid,” he says, tugging it over.

It’s easy to buckle down and get to work, especially after Dylan turns on some music.

And the best part? Dylan wasn’t joking about his knack for folding t-shirts.

“Are you—” Alex stops, coming back into the disaster area wielding two bottles of Gatorade after a break, peeking into the drawer that Dylan has been putting shirts into. “They’re  _ color coded _ .”

Dylan smiles, a little sheepish but mostly real, and takes the blue Gatorade she’s offering him. “I mean, you don’t have to keep them that way, it was just fun to do.”

“You’re so strange,” Alex says, cracking the seal on her own bottle and taking a drink.

“As if you’re not?”

“I’ve never sorted my clothing by color,” Alex notes, moving two of her empty suitcases into her closet. “By team and by sport, sure, but never by color.”

“Fair enough,” Dylan says, putting the last shirt into the drawer before shutting it. “Alright, what’s next?”

Alex looks around, cataloguing the rest of what she has, what needs to be unpacked right now. There’s the garment bag filled with game day suits and dresses, the duffle bag she’s sure is all shoes and nothing else, and one box of various decorations and that’s… pretty much it.

“Anything is fair game,” Alex says, grabbing the garment bag and heading over to her closet to hang them up, hanging the navy blue dress she’ll be wearing to the first game in front of everything else. “I can do the rest of it, honestly.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” Dylan says, unzipping the duffle and she was right, there’s shoes in there but also –

Alright, cool, so that’s where her mom put the boxes of tampons they got from Costco. Good to know, but that also gives her no time to prepare her usual  _ ‘grow up, people with vaginas bleed’ _ spiel reserved for guys finding those things.

But before she can even open her mouth to saying anything like that, Dylan’s taking the boxes out and getting to his feet. “Under the sink in our bathroom?”

Alex blinks, shakes herself out of it and goes, “Uh, yeah, that’s fine.”

“Sweet,” Dylan says, then walks out and, presumably, down the hall and to the bathroom to put them away.

Huh. Nice.

She busies herself putting her shoes away – and by away, she definitely means in a pile in her closet – and when Dylan gets back, he puts himself to work on the box of decorations.

There’s a bunch of pictures in frames that she’ll hang eventually, but she’s fine with him just putting them up on her desk for now.

“You have more pictures of your dog than you do of your family,” Dylan observes, setting yet another picture of Aspen up.

“She’s my baby,” she says, walking over and grabbing one of the smaller frames. “She cried the whole day I left, the big lug.”

“She looks like a sweetie,” Dylan says, smile on his face, fishing in his pocket for his phone, swiping around. “This is my little dude, Oscar,” he says, turning the phone toward Alex to show her the little mop of a dog on the screen.

“Oh my  _ god, _ ” Alex says, grabbing the phone and zooming in on the tiny pile of fluff. “Aspen could eat him for breakfast.”

“Hey!” Dylan says, taking his phone back. “He’s got a big personality, okay?”

“Me too, Oscar,” she says, laughing.

Fifteen minutes later, they can basically see the floor or Alex’s room and nearly everything has been put in some kind of place. It’s organized chaos, Alex reasons, and definitely good enough considering she probably wouldn’t have gotten around to actually unpacking until at least after camp tomorrow.

“Thanks for not being weird about unpacking my shit,” Alex says, flopping back onto her bed. “My own brother is still weird about period stuff.”

Dylan shrugs, sitting in her desk chair, fiddling with picture frames. “It’s not a big deal,” he says, throwing his feet up on the desk, grabbing one of the stress balls sitting on her desk and tossing it between his hands. “I have a little sister, I know how it is.”

“Matty, yeah?” Alex asks and Dylan hums in confirmation. “She’s O-bound in a couple years, right?”

“Up for the next draft,” Dylan says and he sounds so  _ proud.  _ “She’s the feistiest out of all of us. Most of you O girls are.”

Alex smiles, quirks an eyebrow. “What do you mean by that?”

Dylan shrugs, tosses the ball at the ceiling, catches it easily.

“You play how you should to shut up the doubters. It makes you hell to play against,” he says, finally, and Alex knows he means it.

Alex smiles, sweet as can be.

“Good.”

//

Dylan was right about the feistiness, and Alex just didn’t realize it until they played Mississauga for the first time, and she sees Nate Bastian absolutely plaster Patty Fellows into the boards and skate away with the biggest smirk on her face, fist bumping Mikey on the bench as she comes back for the line change.

“Ruthless,” Alex says, and Dylan snuffs a laugh.

“That’s Nater for you,” he says, taking Alex’s water bottle out of her hands and taking a long drink from it before handing it back. “Mikey’s only gotten worse since her and Nate became attached at the hip.”

Next to them, Connor is yelling something in the general direction of a ref about how that was a late hit, how it was behind the play, but –

“Davo, we’re up four-nothing,” Alex says, squirting him in the face with the bottle. “Chill.”

“I  _ am _ chill,” Connor says, indignant. Next to Alex, Dylan snorts.

“And I’m the Queen of England,” Dylan says, under his breath and Alex laughs.

“Pleasure to meet you, your Royal Highness,” Alex says, bowing as best as she can, as Dylan dissolves into even more laughter.

“Stromer! Brinksy! T!” Coach barks, and they all spring to their feet. “Go shut it down!” 

They do shut it down, and Alex maybe throws a few heavy hits of her own. 

x

The thing about Dylan Strome is that he cares. A lot. About damn near everything and damn near everyone.

If you’re friends with Dylan Strome, you have more than likely experienced gentle roasting but also fierce protection, and sometimes kindness that seems like he’s trying to charm the pants off of you. 

Alex is friends with Dylan Strome, but she has also watched him be friends with Mikey McLeod, which shouldn’t be much different, but it is. 

They’re in the locker room after the win, nearly finished getting dressed and ready to head back to the bus when through a gap in the music playing through her headphones, Alex hears Foxy mention something about Dylan fraternizing with the enemy. 

“Ah, so ‘fraternizing’ is what the kids are calling it these days, huh?” Marchy says, and Dylan turns  _ red _ . 

“Fuck off,” Dylan says, half-heartedly as he rolls his eyes. “Mikes and I are just buds.” 

From there, the chatter devolves into chirps and a makeshift tape ball war that gets Alex’s headphones knocked off her ears, but the Mikey Thing isn’t brought up again until they’re on the bus and -- 

“Hey, Brinks,” Dylan says as he sits next to her, picking up the end of one of her braids and brushing it over her nose. “Wanna come to Mikey’s with me? There’s gonna be food and a fat cat.” 

Alex smiles, bats Dylan’s hand away until he drops her pigtail, and actually considers it. But Dylan has always seemed weird about Mikey, and Alex has a sneaking suspicion that  there’s more going on there that meets the eye so --

“Raincheck? I have a FaceTime date with my dog. And my mom, I guess.” 

Dylan laughs, settling into his seat. “Yeah, raincheck.” 

x

She’s not lying about that, either. She really did have a date to coo at Aspen via her computer screen and watch her tilt her head all confused about how yes, her human is there, but not able to be trampled. 

But after that’s said and done, she’s just chilling with a movie on her laptop while Travis plays some stupid trivia game on her phone, hearing it chirp every so often when she finally gets an answer right.

“Shit, I don’t know that,” she mumbles. “Brinksy, what’s the capital of Oklahoma?” 

Alex blinks, thinking about it -- because who the fuck knows the capital of states anymore, let alone Oklahoma? -- but her train of thought is interrupted by a pounding on the door. 

“Ugh,” Travis groans as Alex gets up, the sad noise from her phone signalling that she lost the round. “It’s --”

“Stromer,” Alex says, as she looks through the peep-hole, because that’s definitely Dylan’s dumb face taking up the entire viewing space. She opens the door, letting him in without so much as a word. 

“Stromer is definitely not the capital of Oklahoma,” Travis says, much to Dylan’s confusion and Alex can’t help but laugh. 

“I mean,” Dylan says, flopping onto Alex’s bed, making himself at home. “You’re not wrong.” 

“What was it?” Alex asks, because at this point, she’s genuinely curious. 

Travis sighs, locking her phone and setting it on her bed, waking up her laptop where it lay neglected in her lap. “Oklahoma City.” 

Dylan shakes his head, tsks. “And you call yourself American, Brinks.” 

Alex rolls her eyes. “Don’t even start.”

She goes to sit on her bed, but Dylan moves to get up as soon as she starts sitting down.

“Vending machine?” he asks, nudging her repeatedly. “Come on, I need some peach rings.” 

“You always need peach rings,” Travis says, scrolling on her laptop. 

Dylan rolls his eyes, but holds out his hand to Alex anyway. “Come on, I’ll buy your gummy worms.” 

“You said that last time and then you didn’t have cash,” Alex says, taking his hand and letting him pull her up. 

“That was one time!” he bickers, then to Travis, “We’ll be back!” before he tugs them both out of the room.

They’re all the way down the hall, nearly to the vending machine when Alex realizes that Dylan is way too quiet.

“How was Mikey’s?” she asks, dropping his hand to open the door to the vending machines. 

Dylan shrugs, follows her in. “Kinda weird, honestly.”

Alex hums, inquisitive, as Dylan digs in his pocket for the stray coins he always has jingling around.

“Nate was there too, which isn’t, like, a bad thing,” he says, dropping a couple coins into the machine. “I just thought it was gonna be me and Mikey like it usually is.” 

Alex nods, pushing the buttons necessary for Dylan to get his peach rings. “Did Mikey know that?” 

Dylan shrugs. “I told her when she dropped me off and she said she didn’t even think about it,” he says, grabbing the candy from the well before pushing the buttons for Alex’s gummy worms. “Which is totally fine. I know how she gets when she likes someone.” 

Taking the candy, Alex quirks an eyebrow.

“You think she likes Nate?” 

“Oh, for sure,” Dylan says, ripping his bag open and heading to the door, opening for Alex. “She kept doing her nervous laugh. I think this was a ‘my best friend needs to approve of the person I like’ kind of thing.”

Alex laughs, opening her own candy as they walk right past her and Travis’ room and down to Dylan’s. “You guys are really close, huh?” 

The smile that stretches across his face should really be answer enough, and it warms something in Alex’s chest that she didn’t know was cold.

“She’s one of my favorite people,” he says, and there are very few things Alex has heard him sound so sure about. “Guess I collect the small fiesty types,” he adds, nudging Alex as he opens the door to his room with Connor.

Connor is wrapped up in his blanket when they walk in, headphones on and, for all intents and purposes, dead to the world.

“Hey Davo,” Alex says, flopping onto Dylan’s bed before popping another gummy worm into her mouth, sucking all the sour sugar off before finally biting it in half.

Dylan’s shaking his head as he joins her on the bed, laptop in hand. “Why are you so gross?”

“Hey,” she says, only a little indignant, but mostly amused. “I have a method, alright?”

“Still gross,” he says, opening his laptop. “Mighty Ducks?”

“Would we watch any other movie after a win?” Alex says, snuggling down into the pillows. “Just don’t recite the entire movie this time, you talk enough as it is.”

“You better use headphones,” Connor says from the other bed. “I’ve heard that movie so many times, it’s unreal.”

“Would you rather hear Goon?” Alex asks, knowing that Connor knows that’s the movie they watch after losses. He sighs as she’s chewing on another gummy worm. “Besides, you could always watch it with us.”

Connor smiles at that, and when Alex looks over to Dylan, he’s got this weird look on his face as he looks over at Connor. It’s not angry, nor offended, but more confused. Like he’s looking for the best, most appropriate chirp and it’s just not coming to mind.

Alex nudges him, quirks an eyebrow in silent question and Dylan shakes himself out of it, clicking around until he finds the movie.

“Nothing,” he answers, quietly. “I’m good.”

Alex leaves it and snuggles in to watch Mighty Ducks for the third time that week.

x

They’re on the bus on the way home when Alex plops into the seat next to Dylan on her way back from winning poker, effectively bringing him out of whatever moody-teenager-staring-out-the-window headspace he was in.

“You’re brooding,” Alex says. “Why are you brooding?”

“Am I into Connor?” Dylan says, small and quiet and covered by the noise of whatever card game the other Otters are playing now.

Alex stops, looks at Dylan, and doesn’t say anything. 

See, that makes sense. Dylan and Connor are close, and always in the ways that lead you to believe there’s  _ something  _ there. On the ice after a particularly good goal, they look at each other like they hung the moon. Off the ice, Connor comes out of his shell when he’s around Dylan, and Dylan calms down in a way exclusive to the effect that Connor has on him. 

As it turns out, the only other time Alex has seen Dylan that calm is at home. 

“I mean,” she starts, and Dylan looks down, picking at his cuticles. “It wouldn’t be bad if you were. It would make sense, even.”

Dylan laughs a little, more like a huff of breath with the smallest smile attached.

“What makes you think that?” Alex asks, knocking her knee with his.

Dylan shrugs, then sighs before knocking his knee against hers right back. 

“Mikey was talking about it last night. We were, uh,” he pauses, scratches at the back of his neck and Alex waits him out. “We were talking about some old stuff with us, and she was almost encouraging me to go for it.”

“Do you want to?” Alex asks, and she’s already sure of the answer by the way his face changes.

“There’s no way,” Dylan says. Alex is about to protest, to say that anyone who wouldn’t go for him is nuts, when he sighs. “No, really. He’s about as straight as you can get.”

Alex hums, because that would present kind of a problem.

“His loss, really,” Alex says, nudging Dylan’s arm. “Enough of that. Where’s your PSP, I wanna kick your ass in GTA.”

Dylan smiles, digging in his bag for it and then they don’t say much else the rest of the way home.

//

Alex is well on her way to asleep when she feels someone plop into the usually empty seat next to her. Normally she’d be okay with it but whoever it is, they’re sitting on her blanket and it’s tugging awkwardly, so she minds a little bit. 

She looks over her shoulder, can just barely make out the lanky idiot that she calls her best friend, and gives up on trying to sleep.

“Fuck off, Stromer,” she says, no heat behind the words, especially given the yawn that follows. “It’s, like, two in the morning.” 

Dylan smiles, but it’s not a real one, and that gets Alex to sit up, to turn and face Dylan. He’s slouched a little, very pointedly avoiding looking toward the middle of the bus, and he looks like he hasn’t slept at all since they left Saginaw three hours ago. 

He rarely looks like he sleeps at all, but that’s beside the point. The point is that he looks like something’s bothering him, and that he very much does not want to talk about it. 

And like -- that’s the thing: if Dylan wanted to say something, he would. The kid never shuts up, and Alex is the primary source for that exact fact. He’s constantly chattering away about plays, about the weather. About power-play units, and the test they had in History the other day. About statistics and who his friends are taking to the next school dance. 

But right now, Dylan is completely silent, picking at his cuticles as the hum of the bus’ engine rumbles around them. That’s what concerns Alex the most. 

It’s a testament to how well Alex knows Dylan because she knows their code phrase is coming, even before Dylan sighs.

“Did you catch the highlights of the Wings game last night?” he asks, picking at a stubborn tag of skin. 

Alex shoves the arm of her seat up and out of the way. “Nah,” she says dutifully, reaching down in her backpack for her laptop. “Want to watch them with me?”

Dylan visibly relaxes as Alex tugs the blanket out from under him, hands a corner of it to him. He takes it, small smile on his face as he and Alex arrange it so they can both fit under it as best as they can. Setting the laptop on their laps, Alex clicks into her ‘movies’ folder, then the ‘hockey’ folder in  _ that  _ folder. 

“You’re almost  _ too _ organized,” Dylan grumbles, sinking a little further into his seat. Alex smiles, ignoring the comment all together, then clicks on Miracle. 

It’s easy to fall into this routine they have; a feel-good movie, some happy snuggling-induced endorphins, and Dylan inevitably falling asleep with his cheek resting on Alex’s head. But for now, Alex is content to subject her favorite Canadian to her favorite American movie.

Dylan snuggles in, arms crossed and leaning into Alex a little as the movie plays. Alex vaguely wonders what’s going on this time -- especially since it’s been a few weeks since Dylan’s been so in his head that he’s needed to use the code phrase.

(It was something they came up with when she first moved into their billet house, staying up late into the night due to the excitement of Alex’s first game. Alex couldn’t even remember half the shit they talked about that night, but she remembered this. 

“Mikey and I used to do it, kind of like a social safeword,” Dylan explained, tossing his stupid tennis ball at the ceiling for the hundredth time that night. “So, like, if you ever need me.”

“Yeah,” Alex said, some of the nerves already settling. “You too, yeah?” 

“Duh,” Dylan said, then the ball was tossed directly at Alex’s head.)

They’re barely into the bar scene of the movie before Dylan’s starts bouncing the knee that’s not situated under the laptop. Alex might’ve punched him in the leg if it would’ve been that one, but of course Dylan knows that. 

It’s still shaking them both, though, so Alex smacks the spacebar and looks at Dylan. 

“What’s up,” she says, and it’s not question. 

Dylan sighs, scrubs his hands over his face and then sets his head against the headrest. “I haven’t scored in, like, three games.” 

Alex quirks an eyebrow. Dylan’s literally in the scoring lead for the  _ entire league _ right now, and this is what he’s worked himself up about? 

“Stromer, three games ago you had a six-point night,” Alex states, because he did. Alex was there, picked up four points of her own. “You got me that hatty.” 

“Don’t even, that was all you,” Dylan starts and Alex doesn’t even let him get another word in before elbowing him in the side. “ _ Ouch,  _ you little--” 

“You literally got an assist on all three goals. Shut up,” Alex says, and that gets a sheepish smile out of him. “Come on, Dyl. What are you so worried about?”

Dylan groans. “But  _ Mitch Marner _ is only, like, two points behind me now and if I don’t get my head out of my ass--”

“Okay, first of all, you know what I’m going to say,” Alex says, shutting her laptop and reaching into her backpack. This is apparently a conversation that requires peach rings.

Dylan sighs again, rolling his eyes. “Fuck Mitch Marner. And not literally.” 

“Exactly,” Alex says, handing Dylan her open bag of candy before grabbing another for herself. “That two weeks where you had some kind of hate crush on him was really fuckin’ weird, man.” 

“How do you think  _ I  _ felt about it?” Dylan says, chewing on a peach ring. There’s a small smile on his face at least. 

“World’s order was restored as soon as you wanted to punch him in his shark teeth again,” Alex muses. 

Dylan laughs at that, and it’s a real laugh this time -- the kind that has his eyes crinkling at the corners. “He really does look like a shark. Like that one-- wait, who’s the big one in Nemo?”

Alex quirks an eyebrow, amused smile stretching across her face. “Bruce?” 

“Dude,  _ yes _ ,” Dylan says, and it must’ve been loud enough to wake up Darren, because Alex’s seat gets kicked. 

“Seriously though,” Alex says, nudging him and holding out her hand. He takes it, locking his fingers with hers and Alex ignores the way her heart jumps. “You’re gonna be fine. I promise.” 

“Well, if  _ you _ promise,” he says, squeezing her hand. “I might be inclined to believe you.”

“Good,” she says, tipping her head to rest it on his shoulders. “Just keep your stick down, don’t miss any of my incredible passes, and you’ll be fine.” 

“Aye aye, captain,” he says, resting his cheek against her head. 

x

He keeps his stick down in the next game, that’s for sure, if his hat trick against the Spitfires has anything to show for it. 

“I fucking told you!” Alex shouts, right in his face as they crash in for the celly. It earns her a face wash from his nasty ass glove, but she can’t stop smiling as if she was the one to get the hatty. 

There are a lot of things that make Alex feel like that, and more than a few of them are Dylan-adjacent. But that’s a thought for another time. 

Right after the game, when they’re herded onto the bus and en route back home, Alex gloats, just a little.

“I told you,” she says again, plopping next to him in their makeshift poker circle they’ve created in the back of the bus, motioning for Maksi to deal her in. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Dylan says, rolling his eyes. “You were right, I was wrong, evil has been defeated and all that jazz.” 

Alex laughs, shaking her head and nudges him to get his attention. When he looks over, she taps her cheek, leaning closer to him and he follows the cues perfectly, pressing a soft kiss to her cheek. 

“Eugh,” Darren says, tossing a poker chip at them. “Mom and Dad are being gross.” 

The rest of the Otters chirp and cheer, but Alex calms them down, shouting about a very important clarification: “Wait, Dylan’s totally the mom, right?” 

“Abso-fucking-lutely,” Taylor says. “He’s always got everything, but we’re always dashing back to the EIA because you forgot your phone.” 

“She’d forget her head if it wasn’t attached,” Dylan says, rolling his eyes.

Alex can’t help but laugh. “That’s something my  _ actual  _ mother says.”

“Tracey’s a smart woman,” Dylan says, seriously.

“Fine!” one of them announces, and Alex’s head snaps to the center of the circle.

“For  _ what?” _ she demands, looking right at Darren, but she’s looking at Alex with this look that’s equal parts fond and concerned. Alex doesn’t want to read into it, but she knows that’s the look Darren gives her when she thinks Alex is making some questionable decisions.

Maksi laughs, dealing Owen in. “Friends with the parents.” 

“That has never been a fine be--  _ Ouch,  _ Al, what was that for!” Dylan says, cut off by Alex smacking his arm to shut him up, because arguing a fine does nothing but double it. 

“Valiant effort,” Patty says, “but the fine is still doubled. Dinner on mom and dad when we get home!”

Alex groans, turns to look at Dylan and honestly, she doesn’t know what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t the overwhelming fondness she finds. 

“Who raised these assholes?” she asks, trying to distract herself from the weird rush of contentment she got just from looking at him. 

He laughs, bright and eyes crinkling. “They must take after their father.”

Later, after all the card games have been wrapped up and they’ve finally made it home, Alex readily accepts the fine for Dylan piggy-backing her to the car, too tired to walk and too tired to care. 

//

The thing is that Alex loves winning.

The other thing is that the feeling of the puck hitting the back of the net is only worth it when they come out on top at the final buzzer. 

Sure, it’s great to get on the score sheet – especially when you’re throwing passes to people like Betzy and Davo, and they’re throwing passes right back – but without the payoff of another notch in the win column, the defeat sets in and aches in her chest.

This time, she couldn’t even get on the score sheet. Not even one fucking point, a negative plus-minus rating, and a loss to the fucking Niagara Icedogs.

“Next time,” Dylan says, for the fourth time in five games, because they can’t even manage to string together two wins right now, what the fuck.

“It’s always next time,” she says, maybe a little sharper than necessary as she rips a brush through her hair, catching at the very ends filled with knots. “I’m sick of it. I just want to be fucking  _ better _ .” 

Dylan sighs, leans against the door frame of the bathroom. “You’re already plenty good, Al.”

“Obviously not,” she says, tearing the brush through the ends of her hair and setting the brush down, defeated. “That game was pathetic.” 

“Yeah, it was,” Dylan agrees, no-nonsense. “But it wasn’t pathetic just because of you. Everyone on the backend was a mess. You’re not the goalie, you can’t do any more than create chances.”

Alex laughs a little at that, scrubs a hand at her face before sectioning her hair to start french braiding it. “I used to be a goalie.”

Dylan freezes. “Are you serious?” 

Alex smiles small as she nods, twisting the hair in her fingers, but tangling it in the process. She undoes it, starts again. “Yeah. Couple seasons when I was a kid. The losses got to me too much. I don’t know how Macker does it.” 

Dylan laughs, soft and easy. “Our little Alex, goalie extraordinaire.” 

“Fuck you,” she says, no heat behind it, all the fight drained out of her. Also, her arms fucking hurt from restarting this braid four fucking times, so that’s  _ another  _ fight that drains out of her. “Ugh, I give up.” 

She ties it up in a ponytail, tucking the end of it into the ponytail to make a floppy bun on top of her head before hanging her towel on her hook on the wall. Dylan’s still standing there, relaxed as can be against the door frame, arms crossed against his chest and he looks like he’s thinking about saying something, but he’s debating on it. He has that look a lot around Alex. 

“Use your words,” Alex says, grabbing her moisturizer and putting some on the pads of her fingers before rubbing it into her skin. 

“Want me to braid your hair?” Dylan offers, and Alex nearly pokes herself in the eye. “I learned for Matty, so I think I’ve gotten the hang of it.”

“Oh my god, please,” Alex says, relieved. Her hair really is the biggest mess if she doesn’t tie it back in some way before bed, but she was honestly just so exhausted that she was going to make that a problem for Tomorrow Alex, but if he’s offering…

“Yeah, for sure,” Dylan says, finally pushing off the door frame and heading down the hall. “Meet me in the rec room when you’re done, I’ll pull up the new episode of Parks and Rec.” 

“Dylan William Strome, you’re a boy after my own heart,” she calls after him, grabbing her toothbrush from the cup on the counter. 

x

When she meets him in the rec room, hairbrush in hand, he’s got her favorite flavor of Gatorade next to his terrible blue Gatorade on the coffee table, Parks and Recreation queued up on the television and Alex vaguely wonders if this is what love feels like. 

Well, like. She loves him in the way that she cares about him a lot and he’s one of her favorite people, and even though that happened in a very short period of time, it’s not scary in the way she thinks it should be. 

It’s not scary in the way real, romantic love is supposed to feel, how people have told her that real romantic love is going to feel. 

Maybe he is a boy after her heart after all, but the thing is? She’s not entirely adverse to the idea.

Shaking that train of thought before it even pulls from the station, Alex sits at his feet, handing him the hairbrush in exchange for the remote as she presses play on the show. 

“One or two?” Dylan asks, running his hands through her hair gently, feeling for any snags or pulls. 

“One’s fine,” Alex says, sitting up and tipping her head back just enough so that Dylan has room to work. 

He’s gentle as he works the plaits into her hair, but not too gentle where the braid is loose. It’s a happy medium, one she can never seem to manage on her own. 

“You’re too good at this,” she says as Dylan reaches a point where she can look straight forward.

“I had a lot of practice,” he says, gathering more of her hair in his fingers.

On the TV, Ben Wyatt is giving a terrible wedding toast, proclaiming that Leslie Knope is his “sexy roommate and we love each other!” and behind her, Dylan laughs just as Alex’s heart warms at the scene unfolding. 

She wonders about finding a person that makes her feel like how Ben was describing; getting to come home to them every day and know that they love you, know that they’re your person. 

She wonders what it means if she has that already.

“That,” Alex says before she can stop herself, pointing at the TV. “That’s, like, peak romance there, y’know?”

Dylan’s hands pause for a split second, and Alex goes to backtrack, but then -- 

“You’ve gotta quit reading my mind, dude,” he says, starting the end of the braid. “It’s getting weird.”

Alex smiles, bigger this time, what feels like the first genuine smile she’s had since the game today and leans against Dylan’s leg after he ties off the braid, patting her on the head.

“You’re good,” he says, nudging her with his leg.

“Thanks, Stromer,” she says, reaching a hand back to investigate his handy work, humming appreciatively. 

She stays seated on the ground in front of him, cheek resting on his leg for the rest of the episode. He doesn’t seem to mind.

//

So the summer comes a little too soon and Dylan gets drafted, and he gets drafted  _ high _ . He and Connor look right at home in their shiny new sweaters, “excited to get things started” and “grateful for the opportunity” and “proud to go to such a great organization” and just about every other media cliche in the book.

And, god, Alex is so  _ proud. _

She tells both of them as much, FaceTiming them -- they’re attached at the hip, which makes it easier -- when they have a free minute. 

“Guys, holy  _ shit!”  _ she says, and both of them are beaming, the thrum of media chaos behind them. Connor’s phone is buzzing non-stop in his hand, barely even able to look at Alex where she’s on the screen of Dylan’s phone, but she can’t blame him. “Oh my god, I’m gonna miss you guys.”

“Brinks,” Connor says, fond as ever, and Alex knows he would be ruffling her hair if he was anywhere near her. She misses that the most, the way that she’s the little sister he never wanted but was always happy to have. “It’s not like we’re never gonna come back to Erie. Gotta see our favorite girl lighting it up.”

“Yeah, how could we miss Kyle being the next leading scorer of the OHL?” Dylan says, throwing a wink at Alex and she scoffs.

“I hope a snake crawls into your gear bag,” she says, pointing at Dylan and they both laugh. 

Next to him, Connor’s phone rings for what’s probably the three hundredth time in the five minutes they’ve been FaceTiming.

Dylan holds a finger up, points to Connor and mouths  _ listen _ .

“Yeah, this is,” Connor is saying, and then he goes wide-eyed. 

“Who is it?” Dylan is whispering, and Connor smacks him in the shoulder. “Davo, who is-- ow!” 

“Thank you so much,” Connor says, blush rising high on his cheeks. “No, of course, I’m so excited to get started. Yeah, I’ll see you then.” 

“Who is it?” Alex says, impatient as Connor hangs up the phone.

Connor is blushing, and he can’t seem to close his mouth. 

“Earth to Davo, who--”

“Ryan Nugent-Hopkins,” Connor says, small. “Ryan Nugent-Hopkins just fucking called me, holy shit. She knows I exist?” 

Dylan’s eyes go wide as he laughs and Alex smiles knowingly, familiar with the look of her boys smitten with someone.

It’s almost the same as the look on Dylan’s face when he’s looking at -- 

“Brinks, we gotta go,” Dylan says, giving someone behind the phone a ‘just a minute’. “I’ll call you later, okay?” 

“Yeah, yeah, hotshots,” she says, smiling easily. “Go off and enjoy your fifteen minutes of fame.”

“Okay, love you, bye,” Dylan says, sticking his tongue out before ending the call.

_ Love you, too _ , she still says, even though she knows the call has ended.

x

Summer is over before Alex can even blink, and Dylan is back in Erie sooner than that. Alex has been fulfilling her duty as best friend, distracting him as needed, but she’s been splitting time with Dylan’s phone on that duty. 

She’s not trying to pry, because Dylan has his own life and she knows that. Encourages it, even, because let’s be totally honest here -- this kid runs his mouth at every chance he can get, and not even Alex can keep up most days. Still, that doesn’t mean she’s not curious about who it is that’s taking up so much of Dylan’s time. 

The thing is? She’s not even jealous. She knows how tough it can be for Dylan to open up to people, and if he’s found someone that’s not her, not Connor, or his siblings, then she’s happy for him. 

She just misses his face, seeing as she sees a lot of the top of his head these days.

Her questions are all answered one day when they’re sitting in the locker room, getting ready for practice and Dylan snorts, turns his phone towards Alex and says, “Look at this stupid picture Merks just tagged me in.”

And he’s right, the picture is dumb, and also the kind of shit that Dylan finds funny, so she’s bound to find it a little amusing. 

“Oh,  _ Merks _ , huh?” Alex teases, and, yep, there it is -- Dylan’s telltale flush. 

“Fuck off,” Dylan says, but he’s smiling as he turns back to his phone, typing out some kind of response. “We just got along really well at camp.” 

“Is that what the kids are calling it these days?” Alex says.

Dylan freezes. “Al--” 

“Dude, I’m just fucking with you,” Alex says, flicking a piece of her sock tape at him, because she is just fucking with him. “It’s my job.”

“Who hired you, anyway?” Dylan says, and he sounds a little less on edge than he did. 

Alex shrugs. “Davo. Something about making sure someone's giving you hell while he’s off suffering in Canadian Texas.”

“Great,” Dylan says, deadpan, but he rolls his eyes in the fond way that Alex is used to seeing. 

x

The Nick Thing doesn’t get mentioned again, and Alex does end up seeing more of his face after that, which she’s not sure is a good thing. She didn’t mean to scare him away from talking to her, and even thinking like that makes her feel gross. She’s not Dylan’s girlfriend, and even if she was, she has no say in who he talks to. 

“How’s Merks doing?” Alex asks one day while they’re stretching, when Dylan has his phone basically pressed to his nose again. “ACL, right?”

Dylan nods, switches legs. “She’s okay. Rehab was tough for her the other day. Apparently she told off her PT.”

Alex’s eyes widen, sitting up. “What? No way, what for?” 

Dylan laughs a little. “He said she wasn’t working like she wanted to get back, which is, like, a shitty thing to say anyway,” he says. “So she told him he was being an asshole and went to work with one of the other PTs the rest of the day until he apologized.” 

Alex laughs, because that’s fucking incredible. “Good on her.” 

That loosens Dylan up a little, smiling as he locks his phone. “She’s a firecracker, that’s for sure.”

He gets up, offers his hand to Alex to help her up -- as always -- and they’re almost to the locker room when Dylan nudges her.

“Still going to Darren’s party tonight?” he asks, nudging her a couple more times, knocking her just barely off balance. He’s got a stupid smirk on his face, so it makes sense that the next words out of his mouth are, “I think she’s inviting the cute barista from Timmy’s the girls never shut up about.” 

Alex groans, scrubbing a hand over her face as they walk into the locker room. He’s got his hands on her shoulders, swaying her and she can’t help but laugh. “The one that always gives me extra chocolate on my Iced Capp?” 

“That’s the one,” Dylan says, tugging his hoodie over his head. “Apparently he always asks where you are when D and Maksi go in without you.”

Alex quirks an eyebrow. “That’s a little weird.”

Dylan winces. “Yeah, now that I say it out loud, it’s definitely a little weird.”

“I’ll go if you protect me from extra-chocolate weirdos,” Alex says, and Dylan laughs. 

“It’s funny that you think I’d need to protect you,” Dylan says. “You’re intimidating enough on your own.”

“Good,” she says, then sticks her tongue out for good measure.    
  
x   
  
It’s just a party at Darren’s, so she doesn’t bother to look any cuter than athletic shorts and a t-shirt, braid a little messy from when Dylan redid it after she showered after practice. It’s mostly Otters anyway, so she really doesn’t care at all. 

She’s hanging out with TJ and Maksi on one of the couches, shitty beer pressed in her hand when Maksi nudges her arm and nods to where Dylan’s talking to a girl near the kitchen.

“Look at him go,” she says, and Alex laughs.

“About damn time,” Alex says. “He’s been glued to his phone so much, he needs actual human interaction.” 

“Yeah, what’s up with that?” Maksi says, prying in that gentle way she does when she really wants to be clued in on things. “He and Merkley a thing?”

Pssh. Rookies. 

Still, Alex shrugs. “Just friends, as far as I know. That girl kinda looks like her, honestly.”

“I mean, kind of,” Maksi says, “but she also looks like--”

“Who’s the Brinksy doppelganger that Stromer’s trying to wheel?” Patty says from behind them, leaning against the couch, and Alex’s heart jumps to her throat. 

She can see it, she guesses. Dark brown hair, just about her height, athleisure and a messy bun. In her defense, that’s just about every athlete girl’s unofficial uniform, but even then --

“That’s what I was thinking!” Maksi says. “She might be a little taller, but even her hair is--”

“She does not,” Alex says, taking another drink of her beer. She watches as Taylor comes over to where Dylan’s still talking to her, as Dylan’s face does something she can’t quite read. “She’s just a short brunette.”

He excuses himself and walks with Taylor into the kitchen, and the girl walks off.

Maksi raises her eyebrows, nods slowly, takes a sip out of her cup. “Whatever you say.” 

Alex furrows her eyebrows, finishes her beer and as she’s lowering her cup, she sees Dylan coming from the kitchen, a little frazzled.

She smiles and tilts her head, eyebrows furrowed in silent question, and he nods his toward the porch door in answer. 

“I’ll be back,” she says, pushing herself up and off the couch, toward where Dylan is disappearing onto the porch.

It’s chilly, at least for March, but Alex is nearly certain that isn’t why she has goosebumps. 

“Everything okay?” she asks, parking herself right next to Dylan where he’s leaning on the railing, palms pressed into the bannister. 

He knocks his shoulder into hers, a gentle thing and also an answer: it’s a maybe in its most genuine form. 

She’s looking at him, waiting him out, and she’s a little awestruck at how the streetlight is washing over his face, how his eyelashes stand out, and how much she wants to press a kiss to the highest point of his cheek.

“Dyl?”

“You know those moments when you’re running drills,” he says, suddenly, “and suddenly one thing goes, like, minorly haywire but it helps you to figure out the best way to do the thing?” 

He says it all in one whoosh of breath, like if he didn’t say it then, he wouldn’t say it at all. There’s worry in his tone, like he’s worried Alex won’t understand what he’s trying to say.

Of course she will. She’ll get it, because she gets  _ him. _

Still, Alex nods, says, “Yeah. What about them?”

“I think I just had one,” he says, slow and calculated, like he’s choosing his words very carefully. 

Alex resists the urge to grab his hand, and instead takes a deep breath and says, “and it’s not about hockey.”

Dylan huffs a laugh, shaking his head as he looks down at his hands, then over at Alex and it’s only then that she realizes how close they are. She could just move the slightest bit closer, lean just the tiniest bit--

“Not entirely,” Dylan says, small, like he’s still trying to work through whatever’s got him speaking in fucking hockey metaphors. 

Alex does grab his hand this time, sets hers on top of his and links their fingers together, squeezing just once. Her heart is going a mile a minute, trying to crack Dylan’s code and wondering if maybe this could be what she didn’t know she was waiting for.

“Is it a good thing or a bad thing?” Alex asks, but Dylan’s still got that small smile on his face.

“Hopefully a good thing,” he says, squeezing her fingers with his. 

x

The party winds down soon after they get back inside, so Dylan and Alex head home, content to laze around on the couch in the rec room with some old movie playing on the TV.

Dylan’s got his head in Alex’s lap, which is nothing out of the ordinary. It’s their usual movie-watching positions, nine times out of ten ending with Dylan falling asleep, Alex’s hand carding through his curls as he snores softly. 

It’s become a trend, the last few times they’ve done this, where Alex will let her mind wander and imagine that this is their home. 

Because that’s a thought she’s been having recently -- that her and Dylan will have a home together. 

It’s not exactly a foreign one, in the ways that they’ve talked about it absently. House Hunters is a frequently watched show in their rec room, and they’ve had many heated discussions about whether or not their kitchen will have an island or not (it will, per Alex) or if they need a mudroom (absolutely, where will all the hockey gear go otherwise?) or if they’ll be able to paint their door any kind of color (Dylan wants blue, and Alex can compromise). 

Somewhere between joking and the next episode, Alex fell. 

Or maybe it’s like one of those cartoons, where you can clearly see the object about to fall right on top of the character’s head, but every time they move, it follows them. 

Wanting Dylan wasn’t ever really a second thought because if you can see someone in all of their gross habits and still think about kissing them, or about holding their hand, or about curling up next to them, then it’s probably something a little past  _ want _ .

This though? This feels like the beginning of forever. It feels like late night talks and crying because of homesickness, like hard fought wins and complete blowouts, like absolute certainty and absolute chaos.

It feels like love.

While that’s not much of a new thought either, it’s still one that’s vaguely terrifying in an absolutely exhilarating way. It’s the same love she’s always had for him, just repurposed and all encompassing and--

He’s it for her. 

Like, sure, she’s eighteen and she’s got her whole life to live, and other people to meet, and there have been points with all of her boyfriends where she’s had moments of  _ this could be it _ , but she’s never felt anything like this before. She’s never felt this sure. 

He’s  _ it _ for her. Holy shit, he’s  _ it  _ and it’s not scary, or exhausting like the prospect of forever usually is.

It feels right. 

In her lap, Dylan shifts and Alex can’t help but smile at the way his eyes are half-lidded with sleep. She scratches at his hair, watches as his lips curve into an easy smile. 

She  _ loves _ him.

“You’re gonna hurt your neck if you fall asleep here,” Alex says, as she usually does. “You should probably go to bed.” 

Dylan grumbles, but still pushes himself up to his feet, and before she can process what’s happening, he’s pressing a kiss to Alex’s cheek, nearly the corner of her mouth before heading down the hall.

“Night, Al,” he says behind a yawn.

Alex brings a hand up to her cheek, right where his lips brushed and smiles. 

“Night, Dyls."

 

//

 

The next morning, Alex can’t help but notice that Dylan is acting… weird.

Wait, maybe that’s not the right word, because Dylan tends to be pretty weird all the time, but now he’s just… Squirrelly. Like he’s hiding something, or he’s nervous, or maybe even both. 

“Okay, you’re driving me nuts,” Alex says, after Dylan bounces his tennis ball from the ceiling for what feels like the eight hundredth time in the last ten minutes. “What’s going on.”

“Do you want to--” Dylan starts, pauses as he puts the ball down, scratches at the back of his neck. He’s  _ blushing _ , oh god, what’s going -- “Do you want to get lunch?” 

Alex tilts her head. “Yeah, for sure,” she says, “if you tell me what’s going on.”

“I’ll explain, I promise,” Dylan says, and Alex knows he can see the worry on her face because he’s quick to add, “It’s not bad. At least, I hope not.”

Alex nods, slow. “Okay,” she agrees. “Yeah, Dyls. Sushi?”

Dylan smiles. “Perfect. Downstairs in ten?” 

“For sure,” she says, picking herself up off the couch to go put on real clothes. 

As she’s sorting through her closet, she finds herself trying to squash the butterflies that have built a home in her gut. Is she being too obvious? Has this crush gotten out of hand? This is him letting her down gently, or it could be -- 

Nope. Not going there. 

She throws on a clean t-shirt, some leggings, and grabs a jacket off the back of the door before jamming her feet into her sneakers and heading downstairs. Dylan’s already down there, bouncing his leg at the kitchen table, but he stands up as soon as she comes down the stairs. 

“Ready?” she says, nudging him out of her way, trying to make things feel a little bit normal. 

Dylan smiles, and it’s almost a real one. “Yeah. Let’s go.” 

x

It takes Dylan most of his spicy tuna roll to finally mention what’s going on, instead of filling the silence with conversation much easier than this conversation is apparently about to be. 

“So, uh,” he starts, setting his chopsticks down. “I’m gonna just say a bunch of shit and it might not make sense, but I just -- Promise me you won’t say anything until I’m done?”

Alex sets her own chopsticks down, clears her throat. “Of course. Is everything okay?” 

Dylan smiles, nudges her foot with his. “I’m just afraid I won’t be able to say it at all if I don’t say it all at once.”

This is normally where Alex would make some kind of joke, ease the tension by saying that he tends to operate that way all the time, but that’s not what he needs right now. He needs her to listen. 

“I’m all ears,” she says, folding her hands on the table. 

Dylan sighs, clears his throat and Alex counts to at least thirty before he scratches at the back of his neck and says, “I like you, Al.”

Alex swears that her heart honest-to-god  _ stops _ , those four words playing on a loop in her head as Dylan barrels on.

“A lot. Like, to the point where it might be more? And it’s honestly scaring me shitless, but also probably, uh. Probably the easiest thing I’ve ever let myself feel. And I just need you to know.” 

She can feel the heat rising to her cheeks, the steady thrumming of her heart and it all seems so elementary. 

He  _ likes  _ her. Holy shit, he actually  _ likes  _ her. 

“Wow,” she says, under her breath, what she’s sure is a ridiculously fond smile on her face. 

“And I don’t expect you to feel the same way,” Dylan is saying, but it’s all processing a second late, clouded by the sheer happiness she can feel in her chest. “It’s entirely okay if you don’t, really. We’ll be okay if you don’t. I just -- I needed you to know.” 

She lets the silence sit for about five seconds, nearly certain he’s not going to keep going before she reaches across the table and grabs his hand within her own, shaking a little. 

“Dylan,” she says, voice shaking, unable to control the stupid, dopey grin on her face. “Dylan, holy shit.” 

Dylan laughs, short and nervous, but he squeezes her hand and Alex wonders if it’s grounding for him like it is for her. Always constant, a beacon in a storm. There, reassuring, solid, Dylan, always.

Dylan, forever.

God, that’s a concept.

“I think…” Alex says, pauses as she searches for the right words. “I think this could be great.”

Dylan looks at her, like he’s looking for some sign that she’s joking.

He’s not going to find it. 

“Really?” he says, one whoosh of breath that seems to drain all the panic out of him. “Wait,  _ really _ ?”

Alex smiles, squeezing his hand, knocking a foot against is. “Really,” she says. “I’m with you. We’re on the exact same page.”

“Holy shit,” he breathes, his entire face lighting up. “Oh my god, that’s -- God.” 

Alex lets herself laugh, breathy and easy and that settles the last of the tension, happiness taking over Dylan’s whole face, smiling wide, eyes twinkling as he smiles -- the real one, where his eyes crinkle at the corners. 

She loves that smile, loves  _ him _ .

He clears his throat, squeezes her hand one more time before letting it go, picking up his chopsticks.  “Good. Great, awesome. Love this book.” 

“Best seller,” Alex says, picking her chopsticks back up

“Just give it a Newbery Prize already,” Dylan says, and Alex laughs at that, bright and unabashed and too loud for this restaurant without a care in the world. 

x

The rest of lunch is easy, like their old selves, but tension creeps back in as they start the multiblock walk to the car, hands barely brushing as their arms swing.

After the fourth time, Alex has had enough and she’s decided to carpe the fuck out of this diem, grabbing his hand and linking their fingers together, swinging easily between them.

“Awesome,” Dylan says, holding on tighter.

“Agreed,” Alex says, leaning into him just a little.

When they make it back to the car, Dylan opens her door, but stops her from getting into it with a hand on her waist. Her heart starts racing, blood rushing in her ears and she just  _ knows _ that she’s some ridiculous shade of red but --

“Can I kiss you?” Alex blurts out, just as Dylan starts to ask, “would it be okay if--”

They pause, just looking at each other for a second before busting up laughing.

“This is so  _ dumb, _ ” Dylan laughs. “Why are we like middle-schoolers right now?”

Alex laughs even harder at that, resting her head on his chest as she shakes with it.

They catch their breath, and Alex swears she can feel Dylan’s heart pounding in his chest. It’s easy, then, to tip her head up and put a hand at the nape of his neck, tug him closer and close the gap between them.

It’s perfect, even with Dylan’s lips being a little chapped, even with Alex’s chapstick being a little too scented, even with this happening on one of the busiest streets in Erie fucking Pennsylvania, the car door wide open.

It’s perfect because it’s Dylan. 

//

So it’s been about a week and while they were already inseparable, it hasn’t gotten any worse, but it’s definitely different. 

It’s a good different though, just to clarify. Alex loves being able to hold his hand, to snuggle into him on the couch and, god does she love kissing him.

She always thought it was some kind of cliche when people talked about their significant other being their best friend, but she gets it now. She really, really gets it. They’re good at the couple thing, because they’re good at being best friends. 

They’re good at a lot of things.

In a hotel in bumfuck nowhere Canada, about a week after it’s been called official -- the week that they’ve been  _ Dylan and Alex  _ instead of Dylan-And-Alex -- they’ve figured out that they’re especially good at  _ this _ part, the kissing, the wandering touches. They’re good at kissing each other absolutely dizzy and getting each other off with their hands but —

“Do you maybe want to—“ Alex starts, but then gets cut off by Dylan running a feather light hand down her side, sending a shiver up her spine. “Hey, Dyls. Dylan, look at me.”

Dylan hums, picks his head up from the hickey he was working into her collarbone. “What’s up?”

“Did you maybe want to...” she asks, scratching at the nape of his neck, reveling in his easy smile on his kiss bruised lips, the way he pushes into her hand unintentionally. God, she’s so in— “Do you have a condom?”

“Wait,” Dylan says, brain coming back online. “Wait, fuck I— Yeah, I think so?”

It’s objectively to funny see the realization take hold, then to see Dylan scramble up from where he was half-draped over her and dashing over to his suitcase. He’s just in a pair of basketball shorts, hair twelve different kinds of messy, and there are hockey bruises and  _ Alex _ bruises littering his skin, shifting and moving as he paws through the contents of his bag. 

_ “ _ I thought I had—“ Dylan is grumbling, but then — “aha!”

“You’re a regular explorer,” Alex says, unable to suppress a laugh as Dylan jumps up and flops back on the bed. “You fucking doofus.”

Dylan shrugs, small smile on his face. “ _ Your  _ fucking doofus,” he says easily, tugging at her shirt. 

Which really isn’t hers anyway. It’s an Islanders shirt, so objectively it’s Ryan’s, but when she went to go put it on, it definitely said “JT91” in the tag, so it could be anyone’s, really. 

Alex really hopes she isn’t wearing John Tavares’ shirt. At least, that’s what she’s thinking while she’s pulling it over her head and tossing it aside, probably in the general direction of someone’s suitcase when Dylan sighs.

“Problem,” he groans, foil packet crinkling in his hand. Alex furrows her eyebrows, takes the packet from Dylan and it takes a second for her eyes to adjust at exactly what she’s looking at but when she does, the problem is evident. 

“Damn, Stromer,” she says, smirk on her face as she nudges him in the side.

“Literally shut up, it’s a week past expiration.”

“It takes condoms a while to expire,” Alex shrugs. “Dry spell?”

Dylan rolls his eyes, then digs his fingers into her sides where she’s most ticklish. She squeals, flailing in an attempt to get away, laughing bright and probably too loud for twelve-thirty at night in bumfuck nowhere Canada, but the content and the joy that fills her chest doesn’t give a single fuck what time it is. 

“Oh my god, stop that!” Alex laughs, kicking Dylan in the thigh gently, and he’s laughing, too, and she kind of wants to stay in this moment forever. 

Well, until Dylan presses kisses into her jaw again, his thigh slotting right between hers, pressing perfectly against her. Then she wants to get with the original plan of Dylan getting her off right-the-fuck now. 

“Ask one of the boys for a condom,” Alex says, a little breathy, hands wrapped behind Dylan’s neck, tugging him closer. “Or just go without it. I’m on the pill, I don’t care, just--”

“Like hell we’re going without it,” Dylan says, kissing the pout from her lips, soft and sweet, one huge hand laying heavy over her ribcage. It’s not the only reason her breaths are coming a little heavier. “We’ll just -- Fuck, Patty picked up that one girl earlier, so we can’t ask him.”

Alex raises an eyebrow. “How do you know?” 

“Because TJ snapped me while you were in the bathroom and he’s in Gera and Troy’s room,” Dylan says. “Sexile for sure.” 

“I don’t know, TJ is... weird about Troy,” Alex observes, then “--wait, no, that’s not the point at all, Jesus, what are we -- someone. Anyone. Come on, babe, you gotta--” 

“Al,” Dylan says, punctuates it with a kiss, then brushes a strand of hair from Alex’s flushed cheeks. “Tomorrow, when we’re home. I promise.”

He even sticks out his pinky, and Alex can’t help but laugh as she hooks hers around it, presses her lips to her thumb as Dylan does the same. 

“Tomorrow,” she repeats, unhooking her pinky from his, returning it to his hair. 

“Until then…” Dylan starts, running his hand down her side then back up, hooking his thumb under the bottom band of her sports bra. “Can I go down on you?” 

Alex doesn’t see stars, but it’s a near thing. “Jesus fucking -- Yeah, yeah, please?”

And then Dylan, the bastard, smiles like Alex just gave him the keys to the universe. 

Like all he’s ever wanted to do was eat her out, like she’d been denying herself of a guy that actually  _ wants _ to do something she enjoys having done. Get fucking real.

“Sweet,” he says, and then reaches up to kiss her again and again and again until she’s dizzy and probably making some sounds she won’t be proud of but all of that is irrelevant right now.

“Sweet,” she mimics, breathless and pushing her hips into Dylan’s, grinding slow and sure against him. “Come on, Dyl, please?”

“I’ve got you, Al,” he says, pressing one more kiss to her collarbone before trailing them down her torso. “Tell me what works, okay?”

“Yeah, of course,” Alex nods, running her hand through his curls, sighing into the feeling of his lips against her stomach.

And god,  _ God _ , Alex loves him. She loves him and every day she’s with him, on the ice or at home or in one of their beds or on a bus or –

She  _ loves _ him. Absently, while Dylan’s pulling her shorts off, she thinks it’s a little naïve to love someone she’s been officially dating for less than a week, but inevitability is unavoidable. It was always going to be them. 

He’s careful and practiced with the way he kisses down her stomach, over her hips, then presses his thumb over her underwear, enough pressure to send a zip up her spine, legs falling open as she gives into the feeling. She thinks about last week, about how they laid together and explored each other, and about how this is so much different but also not different at all. 

It’s so trivial, even a little dumb to think about saying that Dylan is  _ good _ at this, because it’s not even impressive. But it’s Dylan, and anything even sex adjacent has always felt good with him, and maybe that’s what love is. The bare minimum feeling like he’s giving her the world.

“God, you’re –  _ Alex _ ,” he says, pressing a kiss to the inside of her thigh just as he slips his thumb underneath the damp fabric covering her, and she can’t help the moan that escapes, halfway to a laugh.

“I mean, yeah,” she says, as Dylan presses slow and tortuous circles over her clit. “Last time I checked.”

Dylan laughs against her skin, shaking his head as he takes his hand away to pull her underwear down and over her hips, tossing them aside.

“Okay?” Dylan asks, one more time, taking her hand as he presses another kiss to her hip.

It’s easy to nod, to squeeze his hand, to let the smallest  _ “yes _ ” fall from her mouth.

“One more kiss?” she asks, squeezing his hand again to get his attention.

He’s quick to comply, clambering up and pressing three quick kisses to her lips, brushing their noses together, then pressing another kiss, this one longer, sweeter.

“Okay,” she says when they part, smiling bright and flush-faced, hand still laced with Dylan’s. “Okay, I’m okay.”

“Okay,” Dylan mimics, kissing his way back down her chest, her stomach, down to her hips and –

“ _ Oh _ ,” she gasps, a barely there thing as he kisses over her, running his tongue through her folds. A quick brush of his tongue sends the tip of it directly over her clit and she squeezes his hand so she doesn’t do something embarrassing like cry or moan too loudly. She solves the latter problem by throwing her arm over her lips, biting at her arm.

He’s enthusiastic, she’ll give him that, and he’s reading her reactions pretty well considering this is the first time they’ve gone this far– pushing his tongue further up when she pushes her hips down, staying where she wants him to be when her hand tugs a bit at his hair, repeating something when her back arches and she lets herself get a little loud.

She’s close – closer than she thought she would get in the five minutes that he’s been driving her a little crazy – and he’s  _ trying  _ so hard just wanting to make it good and it  _ is  _ but she needs –

He’s pressing little sweeping licks to her clit, over her hood, alternating with circling the tip of his tongue around it and  _ that _ . That’s what she needs, but also so much  _ more _ .

“ _ Dyl,” _ she whines. “I’m – can you just.”

Dylan pulls back, presses a sticky kiss to Alex’s inner thigh. “What’s up?”

“I need more,” Alex says, squeezing her eyes shut, pawing at his hair. “Keep doing the circle things but also, like, fingers. Please.”

“I’ve got you,” Dylan promises, pressing another quick kiss to her thigh before fitting his mouth back over her, running the tip of his forefinger over her entrance before pushing in slowly.

“Oh my  _ god _ ,” she gasps, pushing her hips forward, trying to get  _ moremoremore. _ “Please, Dyl, two. I can take it, come on.”

“I know you can,” Dylan mumbles against her and  _ oh,  _ that’s a sensation, and it’s a pretty fucking nice one, especially coupled with him pushing another finger into her, dragging them in and out in a slow slide, letting her adjust. “You’re fucking incredible.”

“ _ God, _ ” she whines, pushing into his hand, into his mouth, and  _ god  _ she’s so fucking close. “Dylan. Dylan please, I’m gonna—”

“Come on, baby,” Dylan hums, crooks his fingers just the slightest bit as he fucks in gently, circling her clit with his tongue like she asked, driving her crazy in the best way possible.

“Fuck, right there, holy shit—” Alex babbles, squeezing his free hand as her stomach swoops, heat pooling low in her spine. “ _ Oh  _ my god.”

Dylan hums again, fucks his fingers in at just the right angle as he laps at her clit a few more times, and that’s all it takes for her to come, arching her back off the bed, choked off moan falling from her lips as she clenches around his fingers. 

“Holy shit, Al,” Dylan breathes, sticky against her thigh as she comes down, aftershocks keeping her fluttering around his fingers. 

“C’mere,” she slurs, a little come-dumb, but with it enough that she wants to return the favor. He pulls his fingers out slowly, wiping them haphazardly on the sheets but she couldn’t care less at this point.  

Dylan doesn’t have to be told twice, scrambling up to lay next to her. They work together to get his shorts down and off his hips, and it’s not long after that she’s closing her hand around him, stroking him easily. 

He sighs, turning to face her and she can’t help but kiss him as she swipes her thumb over the head of his dick, flushed red and slick with precome. It sends a jolt up her spine, the fact that he’s like this just from going down on her, from her reactions. 

She loves him, she realizes, but she does the smart thing and doesn’t say that, just continues to work at getting him off, making him feel as good as he makes her feel. 

She can tell he’s close, his tells easy in the way that he always,  _ always  _ wants to be kissing her while he comes, and she’s not one to deny him. The kisses turn sloppy and so does her rhythm, but that doesn’t seem to matter for Dylan because it’s only a matter of a minute before he’s spilling into her hand and onto his own stomach with a moan.

He sighs, smiling as he’s still pressing kisses to Alex’s lips, eventually batting her hand away and throwing his arm over his eyes. He’s stupid and come-dumb and there’s a blush on his cheeks that only Alex gets to see, and that makes her heart feel like it’s doing honest to god backflips. 

“We’re pretty good at this, huh?” Alex says, soft and easy against his skin as she curls up next to him, and Dylan laughs. 

“I’d say,” he says, taking a deep breath before pushing himself up and padding to the bathroom.

There’s a cursory clean up, and then Dylan lays half on top of her before her better sense comes back and --

“Babe,” she says, scratching at Dylan’s curls. He hums, snuggles into her even more. “I gotta go back to my own room. T will be back any second now.”

Dylan grumbles, but he does roll off her enough so that she can roll out of bed, shamelessly naked as she searches for wherever the fuck Dylan threw her shorts. It takes longer than usual to find them, so in retaliation, she grabs a shirt from his suitcase before she throws her shorts back on. 

She’s about to pull his shirt over her head when she catches his eye, a stupidly fond look on his face, one arm behind his head and the other draped across his stomach. 

She loves him. She  _ loves  _ him. God, it’s only been a week of having this, a week of him being her  _ boyfriend _ and she fucking loves him.

“What?” she says, instead of any of that. 

Dylan smiles, shrugs a little. “You’re beautiful.” 

She laughs, easy as ever before tugging his shirt on. “You’re sweet,” she says, pressing a kiss to his forehead, his nose, his lips. “Put clothes on before T gets back. I think their chel tourney is wrapping up.” 

“Yeah yeah,” Dylan says, but makes no effort to move. She throws her discarded Islanders shirt at him and it lands on his face. 

“Sit by me on the bus tomorrow?” she asks, heading toward the door and Dylan hums.

“Always,” he says, muffled by the fabric. 

She heads out then, knowing Dylan is well on his way to asleep. 

She’s nearly all the way down the hall, almost to her and Maksi’s room, so close to a perfect escape from anyone’s questions when -- 

The door to her room is opening and it’s not Kyle that’s coming through the threshold. 

It’s Taylor. 

Alex knows what she must look like -- messy hair, oversized t-shirt, nearly certain there’s a mark just a bit too high on her throat, but Taylor doesn’t look much better. 

They both freeze, wide-eyed as they take in the other’s appearance. 

“Uh,” Taylor says, scratching at the back of his neck. “Hey, Brinks.” 

“Hey,” she says, head tilted, eyebrows raised as she crosses her arms across her chest. “How’s it going, T?” 

“Good,” he says, quickly. “Great, it’s awesome. Super tired though, so I’m gonna --” he says, motioning down the hall. 

“Mhmm,” Alex hums, trying not to laugh. “I’m sure.”

“I won’t say anything if you won’t,” he says, pointing a finger at her and she holds her hands up in mock defense. 

“Say anything about what? I didn’t see a thing,” Alex says, because she’s a good bro. 

“Me either,” Taylor says, holding out his fist. Alex bumps it, watches as he goes back to his and Dylan’s room, counts to thirty, and then goes into her own. 

When she comes in, the shower is running and Kyle’s bed is almost entirely disassembled.

Well, then. 

She catches a glance of herself in the mirror on the back of the bathroom door and can’t help but smile. She looks exactly how she’d thought, and there’s no guessing who’s room she came from, telling by the huge Mighty Ducks t-shirt she’s wearing and the definitely visible hickey where the collar falls just a little too low. 

When she gets out of the shower, Kyle doesn’t comment, just gives her a knowing smile that Alex returns.

Alex can’t help but shoot a text to Dylan, but as soon as she sends hers, one from Dylan pops up.

alex / 11:42 - maksi and t [eyes emoji]

dyl / 11:42 - so uh… t and kyle?

alex / 11:43 - JIIIIIIINX

dyl / 11:43 - we’re so good lmfao

Yeah, Alex thinks, setting her phone down. They are. 

// 

See the thing here, is that it made sense.  _ They _ made sense, in every way that sense could be made. And here, in Dylan’s bedroom of the home they share, this makes  _ sense _ . 

Her stomach feels like game day and a roller coaster as Dylan presses kisses into her neck, running his hands over her hips and everything feels electric, like she couldn’t get enough of this feeling if she tried. 

She doesn’t really want to try to get enough of the feeling, already a little drunk on his touch, unable to get her hands everywhere she wants on him. She wants to dig her nails into his shoulders with just the slightest sting; wants to press kisses into his stomach, the peaks of his hip bones; wants to leave marks that blossom against his skin like galaxies; wants him inside of her approximately ten minutes ago.

It’s not frantic, or rushed, or anything with a time limit, because they’re good at this. They’re good at exploratory touches and kissing each other dizzy and even though they haven’t gone this far just yet, she knows they’re going to be good at this too.

They’re too good together to be bad at this. 

Dylan’s an expert at reading her, and nearly always has been, so when she tips her hips up, it’s easy for him to tug her sweats down and off her hips, tossing them to join the disaster area that is his bedroom floor.

“Guess I can kiss those goodbye,” Alex says against his lips. “Never going to find them again.”

“Oh, shut up,” Dylan says, rolling them so he’s even more on top of her and Alex loves it, but she would love it a lot more if --

“Come on, Dyl,” she breathes, tugging at his shirt. “Off? Please?”

Dylan smiles against her lips, sitting back against her legs as he straddles her, tugging the shirt over his head and tossing it to the ground before reaching for the hem of hers. With some wiggling -- because Alex does not want to do crunches to get naked, thank you very much -- they manage to get her shirt off, adding to the mess.

“Condom,” Alex manages as Dylan takes her panties off, standing to shove his own sweats and boxers down. She really will  _ never  _ get over that sight. Damn.

“In my drawer,” he says, kissing down her neck. “Can I get you off once first?” 

Alex doesn’t mean to, but she moans, a hum stuck in the back of her throat. 

“Fuck, yeah,” Alex says, and that’s all it takes for Dylan’s hands to trace down her side, over her hips, then finally,  _ finally  _ between her legs. 

She knows she’s already so wet, just from the anticipation, from his near-expert kisses and knowledge of her weak spots especially-- 

“ _ Fuck _ ,” she gasps as Dylan’s practiced fingers find her clit, pressing slick circles with perfect pressure. “Oh my god.” 

He keeps up with the kisses to her neck, just at the hinge of her jaw and she lets her eyes close, giving into the feeling, the electric touch of his hands on her skin. It’s so good, and she feels like she could set fire but -- 

“Mmm, changed my mind,” she says, tugging him in for a kiss. “Want you now. Please.” 

Dylan swears into her skin, but he’s not one to deny her anything, even if it means getting his hands off of her. “Fuck, okay. Okay.” 

It’s only a little fumbly, and even then it’s endearing in the best ways possible. They work together to get the condom over him, managing not to tear it or do it wrong or anything like that. 

See? They’re totally good at this. 

Alex smiles into the kisses Dylan presses into her lips as she jacks him off easily, slick with lube and probably her own arousal. It’s making her head spin.

“Good?” Alex asks.

“Yeah,” Dylan says, breathy. “You?”

“Good,” she affirms. “Go for it.”

He doesn’t need to be told twice, kissing her as he pushes inside slowly, allowing Alex to relax around him and -- 

“ _ God _ ,” Alex gasps, letting a hand come up to grip at his hair, scratching lightly into his scalp. 

“Okay?” he asks, hands on either side of her head, and she’s quick to nod. 

“So okay,” she says. “Please.”

He starts to move and if Alex thought she couldn’t get enough of this feeling before, she certainly won’t be able to now, the slide and friction just enough to set her nerve endings on fire, his lips pressing into hers, and it’s only then that she realizes that this isn’t going to last nearly as long as she wants this to.

Whatever. They’re young.

“Al,” Dylan gasps, and, shit, her grip on his hair was a little hard there, but he didn’t seem to mind, judging at his change in rhythm. A little faster, a little more urgent, a hand snaking between them to rub at her clit and -- 

“Oh, shit,” she gasps, clenching around him in surprise, which pulls a moan from his lips. “Dyl, please.”

“You first, come on,” Dylan says, kissing down her neck, to her collarbone where he sucks a  _ hard _ mark into the skin there. 

Between that, the circles at her clit, and tipping her hips up to get just the right angle, it’s easy to get there, coming around him with his name on her lips and a drag of her nails down his back.

She barely registers that he’s slowed his rhythm before she can feel his arms shaking, and manages to blink the stars away enough to put her hands on his hips, pulling him forward. 

He hesitates, but follows. “You’re sure?” 

“Yeah,” she breathes, “come on, babe.” 

It’s…  a lot, but in the best possible way, and it only takes a couple more thrusts before Dylan’s hips stutter, kissing Alex sweet and firm and sloppy as he comes, moans muffled against Alex’s lips.

She takes a deep breath, cheeks still flaming, walls still fluttering and oversensitive, but still so  _ so _ pleased.

“I --” she starts, then stops. Not yet. “Wow,” she settles on, pressing a kiss to his chest. 

Dylan laughs a little weakly as he still tries to catch his breath, before slowly  _ slowly _ pulling out of her, kissing her in apology as she winces, a little sore in the best way possible.

“Wow,” he agrees, tying the condom off and tossing it in the trash by his bedside. 

It’s easy to curl into him, to bask in the slightly-sticky afterglow, his hand tracing easy patterns up and down her back as she draws idle circles on her chest. 

Between the easy brushes and the kisses he keeps pressing to her head, she’s nearly asleep by the time she hears him say, “You’ll come visit me, wherever I end up this summer, right?”

Humming, she lifts her head up, resting it on her hand. “Of course.”

His smile is so bright, cheeks still so pink, and she  _ loves _ him. 

She has to kiss him, trying to send that through the press of her lips, the sweep of her tongue. From the happy sigh she earns from him, it’s safe the say the message was received. 

Signed, sealed, delivered.

//

At the end of the first round, Alex barely even registers that she’s not one of the thirty people on the floor wearing a shiny new sweater and a terrible fitted hat. 

Her mom is rubbing her back as they leave the seating area of the lower bowl, and while she’s grateful her family is here -- even Andrew and his terrible attempts at getting her to actually smile -- there’s an ache in her chest and a tug at her heart coming from the general direction of Arizona.

She gets it, okay, she really does. Dylan’s working so hard and she’s so incredibly proud of him, but  _ god _ it would be nice to have him here. 

He’s here in some sense though, if the constant buzzing in the pocket of her dress is anything to go by. When she checks, there’s what looks like one message with approximately fifty eye roll emojis, followed by another message with every heart in the emoji lexicon. 

“Dylan?” her mom asks, nudging her as they walk the concourse of First Niagara. 

She nods, pocketing her phone. “I think he’s more upset than I am, honestly.” 

Her mom smiles then throws an arm over her shoulder, tugs her into a side hug that she lets herself lean into, just a little.

By the time they make it back to the hotel, Alex is exhausted and just wants to cuddle something that’s not the stuffed otter that Dylan brought her the last time he visited. Namely, she wants that something to be Dylan. 

“Tell me it’s dumb and selfish that I want you to be here,” she says, phone tucked between her shoulder and her cheek as she browses through TV channels. 

“You know what I’m going to say,” Dylan says, and Alex can almost see the dumb, fond look on his face that she loves. 

Alex sighs. “That it’s not dumb because it’s what I feel,” she says. “I know.”

“Exactly,” he says. “Besides, I’m right here.”

She smiles, because even if it’s not the kind of  _ here _ that she wants, it’s still something.

Quiet as she finds something to watch on TV, Dylan says, “I have an idea.”

“Because that’s never terrifying.”

“You wound me, Lex,” Dylan says, exaggerated. It gets Alex to laugh, which she knows is what he wanted, sly motherfucker. “Seriously though. Find a restaurant around your hotel, I’ll get something delivered for you.” 

She could cry, just from the thought of Dylan doing that for her. 

“Are you sure?” she asks, even though she knows that he won’t take no for an answer. 

“Least I can do, kitty,” he says. “I think there’s a good pizza place around that hotel.”

She’s always a sucker for pizza. 

She puts the phone on speaker as she looks through restaurants, finally settling on a pizza place that Dylan had agreed sounded pretty good. From there the conversation is easy; a little distracting, some gentle teasing of the teams that passed on her the only talk of hockey. 

“Hey, babe, hang on for sec, okay?” Dylan says, at a brief lull in conversation. “Trish is on the other line, it’ll take just a second.” 

“Yeah, for sure,” she says, opening Instagram and catching up with what she’s missed in the last -- god, they’ve been on the phone for over an hour? 

It really is a second before Dylan’s back on the line. “She says hi and good luck.”

Alex smiles, can feel the warmth from the well wishes in her chest. “I love Trish.” 

“She loves you, too,” Dylan says. “She told me to pick you up ice cream, too, but you and I both know I can never get your favorite flavor right.”

“Ben and Jerry’s Phish Food,” Alex supplies, for what’s probably the three hundredth time since they were even just friends. It’s a battle not worth fighting, and frankly, she wouldn’t expect him to remember since she can’t remember his either.

Compromise.

“See, like, I  _ know _ that,” Dylan says, and that gets her to laugh. “But also, I don’t want your pizza to get cold because I stopped at Seven-Eleven to grab ice cream.”

Alex freezes, heart jumping in her chest. “What?”

“Oh, also,” Dylan says, and then there’s a knock at her door that she can also hear on the phone. “You should get the door.”

“Dylan,” Alex manages, getting to her feet and heading for the door, legs shaking a little. “Are you fucking serious?”

She opens the door, answering her own question, because sure as fuck --

“Delivery,” Dylan says, hanging up the phone with a huge smile on his face, pizza in hand and Alex can’t help the tears that gather in her eyes.

He lets himself in, sets the pizza on the dresser and the second his hands are free, Alex is in his arms, feet off the ground and nose buried in his neck.

“You’re  _ here _ ,” Alex says, lets a few tears fall because he  _ is _ . He’s  _ right here _ , and she had no idea.

Dylan laughs, light and easy, squeezing her tighter and Alex feels like her heart could burst. “I am.”

“Oh my fucking  _ god _ ,” she says, letting her legs wrap around his waist. He follows her lead spectacularly, shifts his grip to hold onto her and give her the leverage she needs to tug him into a kiss and  _ god _ that’s what she needed.

She needed him, and every ounce of love and assurance and  _ home _ that bleeds into his kisses, into his touch.

But also –

“You absolute fucking asshole,” she says, no heat behind it at all and then kisses him again. “You were here the whole time?”

Dylan laughs, backs up so he can sit on the bed, Alex in his lap. “I was going to surprise you when you got called,” he says, brushing a stray hair from her face and tucking it behind her ear. “Not my fault that the entire league is incredibly stupid and has no idea what they’re missing out on.”

“Not the entire league,” she says, softly. “There’s still – five of them didn’t have first rounders.”

“And one of those teams is going to win the lottery,” Dylan says, settling his hands on her hips. “And then you’ll make it to the League, and all these teams will regret that they ever passed on you.”

“I love you,” Alex says needlessly, Dylan’s face in her hands, because she could feel it bubbling up in her chest, and she’s unsure she’s able to say much else right now. 

“I love  _ you _ ,” he says, leaning into her hand before turning his head, pressing a kiss to her palm. “Now, up. Pizza.”

In true hockey player fashion, they kill the pizza and half of the cheesy breadsticks (has Alex mentioned she loves him?) before curling up together, content to exchange lazy kisses, easy touches. It’s grounding, and perfect, and exactly what Alex needs to calm her nerves. 

With Dylan curled around her, his head resting on her chest and his arms wrapped around her waist, it’s easier to fall asleep than it has been in just over a month.

x

Chicago. 

Alex is going to  _ Chicago. _

The part of her that grew up with a Red Wings bedspread is dead inside, but that doesn’t stop the fluttering in her chest or the smile on her face.

She’s going to the fucking  _ National Hockey League. _

Dylan is beaming, waiting patiently to hug her after she hugs her parents, her brother, and when he finally does hug her, it’s so tight and and all encompassing that she almost misses what he’s saying: “I’m so fucking  _ proud  _ of you.”

She doesn’t even process the fact that she kisses him until she pulls away and catches a smudge of bright red lipstick on his smile.

Well, that’s one way to do that.  _ Hey, media, meet my boyfriend _ , she thinks as she’s handing her cardigan to her mom and heading down the stairs to get her jersey. 

Her jersey.

Because she just got drafted into the fucking NHL.

Holy shit. 

From there, it’s a whirlwind of media, and pictures, and only one reporter from the NHL website mentioning Dylan at all.

“Looked like you had quite the cheering section for you there. Friends, family, and... teammates,” he says, and he’s got this look in his eye that makes Alex’s skin crawl a little. “How have they helped prepare you for this moment?” 

Alex resists the urge to roll her eyes, but instead she just smiles and says, “Yeah, they’ve obviously been a huge help. Their support has kept me going, I wouldn’t be here without them.” 

“Alright, Alex, we’ve gotta get to the family section,” the PR agent says, bless her soul, and Alex thanks the media before heading out of the scrum. 

“Thank you,” Alex says as they’re heading away, because she’s sure if someone asked her a straight-out question about Dylan, she probably wouldn’t be very media tame.

The PR agent just smiles, pats Alex on the shoulder and ushers her back to the family room.

Her mom is chatting with someone official looking -- she’s about eighty percent sure it’s the president of the Hawks, holy shit -- her dad and her brother are talking to someone across the room and Dylan’s just -- 

He’s leaning against one of the couches in the suite, probably scrolling through their hundreds of dumb selfies to post a congratulations tweet, tall and tan and still a little blond and Alex is so in love with him. The click of her heels gives her away and then he’s looking at her like she hung the moon, like there’s nowhere else he’d rather be than here in Buffalo, New York.

“Dylan,” she says, can barely get the word out of her mouth before she’s smiling almost too hard to speak.

Before she can process it, Dylan’s coming over and lifting her off her feet and spinning her around in a circle, like this is some cheesy rom-com and not a room full of people who see the potential in Alex’s hockey. Even then, she can’t help but laugh as he sets her down, kisses her forehead. 

“God,” he says, looking at her. “ _ God _ , Al. Chicago.” 

“Chicago,” she says on a little bit of a laugh. “It doesn’t even feel real.” 

“Well, you better believe it, sunshine,” he says, pinching her in the shoulder and she laughs as she bats his hand away in favor of hugging him around the waist as he kisses the top of her head. “I’m so proud of you, baby.” 

“I’m so happy you’re here,” she says, tipping her head up. “Sorry I kissed you on NHL network.” 

He laughs, presses an easy kiss to her lips. “Fine with me. Just means I can post something on Twitter that’s even sappier than what I had planned.” 

Alex groans. “Don’t you even da--” 

“Alright, pictures!” her mom calls, taking Alex by the hand and dragging her toward the photographer, away from Dylan where he looks frozen to the floor. Her mom isn’t having that though, waving him over and saying, “Are you waiting for an invitation, Dylan? Come on. Family photo.”

Alex wants to be embarrassed, wants to roll her eyes, but the look on Dylan’s face as he walks over for the photo makes all that melt away.

_ Yeah _ , Alex thinks as she puts an arm around Dylan, the other around her mom.  _ Family _ .

//

Dylan is lucky that Alex loves him. 

Okay, well that’s a given, but he should feel  _ really  _ lucky right now, seeing as she’s moving all of their things into the apartment they’re renting this season, thankful for the help of Matty who drove her car filled with Dylan’s shit from Mississauga this morning. 

“He owes you at least two home cooked meals a month for this,” Matty says, grabbing another box from the back of Dylan’s beat-up Civic and starting into the house. 

“Do you want me to die?” Alex asks, grabbing a couple boxes out of her own car and heading in after her. “Kid can barely make ramen.”

Matty laughs, dropping the box in the living room before heading back down the stairs. “Well, at least I won’t need cardio today!”

“You’re the best little sister I never wanted!” 

x

It doesn’t take many more trips from the car to at least get everything in a designated room, and by the time Matty leaves, Maksi, Darren and T have all made themselves at home on her living room floor. 

“So, what’s hot-shot up to?” Darren asks, pointedly ignoring the gross fond eyes happening between her brother and Kyle. 

Alex shrugs, checks her phone for the time. “He’s probably asleep. I have to get him from Pittsburgh at, like, ten-ish.” 

“How’s he doing?” Kyle asks, locking her own phone, leaning into Taylor. 

Alex shrugs. “He’s bummed, but also, like, crazy motivated now. He’s already planning on making us run five miles after he gets off a fucking plane.”

“Overachiever,” Darren scoffs, but she’s smiling, because if anyone else understands how Dylan gets, it’s definitely Darren. “He did that after Connor broke his hand, too, remember?” 

Alex groans. “God, unfortunately.” 

Eventually the conversation shifts and settles, the easy autumn breeze blowing through the open window and Alex smiles, already so excited for what this year is going to mean for her, for her and Dylan, for the  _ team. _ There’s something heavy in her chest, a burning motivation to prove that she should’ve gone higher, that she’s Chicago’s secret weapon. 

The fact that she gets to do it with Dylan by her side? Well, that makes it even better. 

x

Morning comes quickly after Alex’s late night with the other Otters, and though she probably won’t admit it, she’s definitely happy at Last Night Alex’s decision to set an alarm that allowed time to grab coffee. 

She could order coffee in her sleep, it’s the making sure she grabs enough TimBits for Dylan that requires a little extra brain power, but she manages pretty well. The two hours from Erie to Pittsburgh fly by, and before she knows it, there’s a rap at the window of her car and her gangly idiot of a boyfriend standing outside of it. 

Nearly getting tangled in her seatbelt in an effort to get out, she manages to get out, pop the trunk of her car as she walks around to wrap her arms around him. 

“How do you smell so good after getting off an airplane?” Alex mumbles into his chest, and she loves that she can feel him laugh. It’s been too long since she’s felt that. 

“Hey kitty cat,” he says, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “Nice shirt.” 

Alex unwraps herself from him for long enough to look at the logo on her chest; one of Dylan’s nice Coyotes ones, just a little big but comfortable as all hell. 

“Thanks, it’s my boyfriend’s,” she says, moving around the front of the car as Dylan puts his stuff in the back. “He’s kind of a big deal.” 

“Mmm,” Dylan hums, shutting the trunk and getting in the car just as Alex tucks herself into the driver’s side. He wastes no time putting his hand over hers where she’s resting it on the gear shift. “Pretty lucky guy.” 

“He’s pretty great,” Alex says, squeezing his hand before throwing the car in drive and heading back toward the freeway. “I think I’ll keep him around.” 

x

Later, after their run and a much needed nap -- a nap with no distractions, even, which are few and far between -- they’re back on the ice and aside from their actual bed, nothing has felt as much like home than the ice beneath her feet. 

It’s like Dylan never left, joking with the other Otters before his broody pregame routine, going around and throwing a wrench in their own pregame things by poking pucks away with his stick, checking the boys into the boards. 

Same old shenanigans, same old Dylan, whole new meaning to this season. 

“Guess ‘A’ really is for Alex, eh?” Dylan says, nudging Alex just barely off her usual spot at the blueline as she handles a puck through a few stray ones. He knocks his fist over the letter over her heart, and she can’t help but smile.

“Aye, aye, Captain,” Alex says, knocking his own letter right back. “Guess we make a pretty good team.” 

“That’s a fine,” Girhs is saying behind them as they file off the ice after warm-ups. “Nauseatingly cute banter. My poor, innocent eyes.”

“Don’t even try that,” Alex says, rolling her eyes, but she makes a note to toss a twenty in the jar anyway; better safe than sorry when it comes to the fines the Otters dish out. 

Dylan’s the first one out of the room after the lineup is announced, but Alex follows soon after, standing at the end of the tunnel as they look out at the ice.  _ Their  _ ice. 

“Don’t get all emo on me now, Stromer,” she says, bringing him out of whatever zone he was in.

Dylan laughs a little, pushes her a bit. “I’m not. It’s just-- This is it. Last shot.” 

“Last shot,” Alex says, nudging him right back. “Let’s make it worth it. You’re getting at least one ring out of this.”

“At least?” Dylan says, quirking an eyebrow. “That’s bold, DeBrincat. Gonna make us champions?”

“You really think I’d say that to your superstitious ass?” Alex says, leaning against the stands, and Dylan laughs. “Get real.”

“In that case,” Dylan says, slipping his glove off and reaching underneath his jersey, tugging two chains from it. There’s a ring on each of them, thin silver bands, one smaller than the other. “You’re getting at least one ring out of this, too.”

“Dylan, please for the love of  _ god _ ,” Alex starts as Dylan’s taking his helmet off, slipping one of the chains off. He unclips Alex’s helmet, lets her take it off before he slips the chain over her own head. 

“No,” he says, answering the question before it can even be asked. “Not an engagement. Just a promise.” 

Alex sighs, a little watery, but the smile on her face. “Fucking  _ christ _ ,” she says, tucking the chain into her jersey. “Give me a heart attack, why don’t you.”

“Mmm,” Dylan says, “That’s not really in the plan.”

“Oh?” Alex says, quirking an eyebrow, “Please, tell me exactly what this plan of yours is.” 

Dylan smiles, soft and real and Alex’s heart feels like it could burst. “Well, namely, winning this game. Hopefully winning a lot more games. Kissing you a lot. Maybe winning some shiny things. We’ll see how it goes.” 

“Pretty solid if you ask me,” Alex says, tipping her head up in search of a kiss, a request that Dylan obliges to...

...In the exact moment that the rest of the Otters come to the tunnel.

Through the barrages of chirps, fines being doled out, and fake wretching, Alex can’t help but look at Dylan, the ice in her peripheral vision, and feel like she’s already won. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> cast of girls in this includes: alex (obvs), mikey mcleod, nate bastian, travis dermott, kyle maksimovich, ryan nugent-hopkins, and countless others that i'm sure will show up in this verse bc i will never stop writing in it thanks for coming to my ted talk


End file.
